Tessia
and
Michael
Please join us for our wedding celebration on
Our Story
All my life I had commuted to school, I'd never been away on my own, lived in a new community, experienced the world as a person closer to an adult than a child. I felt I was missing an opportunity in my life in the middle of my college career. Coincidentally, my dad was working in California at the time, and while there, he came across the opportunity I had been looking for. During a Judo tournament, he met a woman from a certain university, one that offered a year long scholarship to study your martial art of choice in Japan in the hopes to teach and spread your knowledge in your home country. This university is the International Budo University. This happened in 2016.
By the time I had learned about it, papers and applications were due. We were reassured it would not matter, that I was a strong candidate who could sneak through being a little late. However, it was all too sudden, to unexpectedly ship myself off to Japan for a year with only a couple weeks notice, rushing all the while to prepare and send official documents. We decided to postpone our application a year, unknowingly, to the year Tessia would be there as well.
One year later, we applied, and the following spring, I arrived in Japan. It was there I met Tessia, then 2020 Olympic hopeful for Malagasy Judo. She was there on a special invitation from the International Olympic Committee and the Japanese Olympic Committee to increase representation in the Games. I soon learned why she was selected, witnessing the intensity she brought to her training, and the vigor in her life complimenting it. If we hadn't decided to wait another year to apply, I likely would have never met her.
The international students' dorm has a small collection of cutlery and silverware mixed in with peoples' personal sets. One day, the bowl I'd bought went missing, and having seen everyone else using their own, I had a sneaking suspicion of where it'd gotten off to. Unfortunately, when Tessia finally came around with it and I made it clear the bowl was mine, she believed I was upset since I had mostly kept to myself and tonality or joking can be harder to pick up on between languages. Of course, we would interact again not long after.
Since I speak Japanese, I often acted as the translator between the Japanese and international students. So when one of the Japanese students offered to take her to the beach, I invited myself as the medium. Before then though, I told Tessia how I felt about her, and began to understand hers for me. Much to the disappointment of the student who asked her out, we were already dating by the time their day at the beach came around!
We spent that year together, discovering Tokyo and Osaka, day-tripping to Aizukawamatsu, competing in Chiba, and learning about each other the whole time. In the middle of that year, I promised Tessia I would come Madagascar to meet her family, to give legitimacy to our relationship. After my year in Japan ended, I traveled to Madagascar to join Tessia before she returned to continue her Olympic preparation. I met her family, experienced the Malagasy countryside and urban cityscape, as well as their many villages. I knew I loved her, and I was ready for anything to be with her. By the end of my trip, I'd recieved the blessing of her parents, and promised the next time I returned to Madagascar, it would be to take her hand in marriage.
Over the 5 years that followed, we visited each other wherever we were, spent holidays together, celebrated birthdays, went on roadtrips, loved each other, and ultimately got engaged. I returned to Madagascar in 2023 as I had promised 5 years earlier, and fulfilled the customary engagement traditions required by Malagasy culture to take Tessia's hand in her family's and ancestors' eyes. Now, in 2024, the day that had been a far away dream is now a reality, a 6 year journey all culminating in a single moment. None of this was possible without the help of many, many people, many of whom are likely reading this. For those of you who did, thank you. Every prayer, every message, every shoulder to lean on and ear that listened, you made this possible. Thank you, and we hope to see you very soon, when not only Tessia and I, but all of us gather as a family.
By the time I had learned about it, papers and applications were due. We were reassured it would not matter, that I was a strong candidate who could sneak through being a little late. However, it was all too sudden, to unexpectedly ship myself off to Japan for a year with only a couple weeks notice, rushing all the while to prepare and send official documents. We decided to postpone our application a year, unknowingly, to the year Tessia would be there as well.
One year later, we applied, and the following spring, I arrived in Japan. It was there I met Tessia, then 2020 Olympic hopeful for Malagasy Judo. She was there on a special invitation from the International Olympic Committee and the Japanese Olympic Committee to increase representation in the Games. I soon learned why she was selected, witnessing the intensity she brought to her training, and the vigor in her life complimenting it. If we hadn't decided to wait another year to apply, I likely would have never met her.
The international students' dorm has a small collection of cutlery and silverware mixed in with peoples' personal sets. One day, the bowl I'd bought went missing, and having seen everyone else using their own, I had a sneaking suspicion of where it'd gotten off to. Unfortunately, when Tessia finally came around with it and I made it clear the bowl was mine, she believed I was upset since I had mostly kept to myself and tonality or joking can be harder to pick up on between languages. Of course, we would interact again not long after.
Since I speak Japanese, I often acted as the translator between the Japanese and international students. So when one of the Japanese students offered to take her to the beach, I invited myself as the medium. Before then though, I told Tessia how I felt about her, and began to understand hers for me. Much to the disappointment of the student who asked her out, we were already dating by the time their day at the beach came around!
We spent that year together, discovering Tokyo and Osaka, day-tripping to Aizukawamatsu, competing in Chiba, and learning about each other the whole time. In the middle of that year, I promised Tessia I would come Madagascar to meet her family, to give legitimacy to our relationship. After my year in Japan ended, I traveled to Madagascar to join Tessia before she returned to continue her Olympic preparation. I met her family, experienced the Malagasy countryside and urban cityscape, as well as their many villages. I knew I loved her, and I was ready for anything to be with her. By the end of my trip, I'd recieved the blessing of her parents, and promised the next time I returned to Madagascar, it would be to take her hand in marriage.
Over the 5 years that followed, we visited each other wherever we were, spent holidays together, celebrated birthdays, went on roadtrips, loved each other, and ultimately got engaged. I returned to Madagascar in 2023 as I had promised 5 years earlier, and fulfilled the customary engagement traditions required by Malagasy culture to take Tessia's hand in her family's and ancestors' eyes. Now, in 2024, the day that had been a far away dream is now a reality, a 6 year journey all culminating in a single moment. None of this was possible without the help of many, many people, many of whom are likely reading this. For those of you who did, thank you. Every prayer, every message, every shoulder to lean on and ear that listened, you made this possible. Thank you, and we hope to see you very soon, when not only Tessia and I, but all of us gather as a family.